


A Fortune for Your Disaster

by romanticalgirl



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Physical Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-08
Updated: 2009-11-08
Packaged: 2017-10-23 11:31:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/249835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romanticalgirl/pseuds/romanticalgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They try to straighten him out, but every time he comes up a little more bent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Fortune for Your Disaster

**Author's Note:**

> So, two things: Pete Wentz went to boot camp and Pete Wentz is not a fan of penises (including his own). These are things that Pete Wentz himself has said/put into the public record. He doesn't talk about boot camp, which makes me wonder what happened there. Also, this is for [](http://inlovewithnight.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://inlovewithnight.livejournal.com/)**inlovewithnight** because it makes her make seal noises of glee. We are a special pair, she and I. Unbetaed, all mistakes are my own.

  
He’s not sure when or where it starts. He’s not even sure how. Maybe the day he was born, maybe the day he hit puberty. Maybe always. Maybe never. He doesn’t remember his life _not_ like this – manic, unable to sleep, a million things in his head. He thinks he was seven when they started the drugs, but none of them worked. Not really. Not right. Not enough. Nothing stops it. Nothing lets him sleep. He strives for normal and misses every time.

He hears the same refrain over and over, that there’s something wrong with him, and he’s gotten to the point where maybe he believes it. It’s hard not to when he’s faced with the disappointed looks his parents give him, when he reads the report cards and conference notes - _If Pete would just apply himself_ \- and they all just echo, never stop. He’s a screw up, a fuck up, and he needs to be fixed, needs whatever it is that drives the manic energy through his blood to dissipate.

Doctor after doctor and they all say the same thing. There’s nothing wrong with him, but obviously there’s something. Something wrong, or something not right. His doctor – not _his_ doctor, he’s no advocate for Pete – tries him on different cocktails of medications. Uppers, downers, sleeping pills – Ambien. Amitriptyline. Chlordiazepoxide. Clonazepam. Depakote. Halcion. Haloperidol. Klonopin. Lamictal. Lithium. Neurontin. Nortriptyline. Seconal. Seroquel. Thorazine. Trazodone. Valium. Verapamil. Xanax. Zyban – An alphabet of drugs in every combination and every possible dosage. He loses thirty pounds in two weeks and physically _cannot_ keep his eyes closed. Then the regimen switches and starts again. His sense of smell disappears and he falls asleep one day while walking home, unable to adequately explain the resulting bloody nose, cut lip and the need for a trip to the dentist. He changes doctors. He changes teachers, but _he_ doesn’t change, and when all is said and done, _he’s_ the actual problem.

The thing is that he's smart. That's what his mom says when she and his dad, or she and her friends talk about him. She doesn't understand why he's like this, why he isn't at the top of his class. She doesn't understand and he can't explain that there are all these things - voice, ideas, words, pictures - alive in his head, louder and brighter than the outside world. He can't sleep, can't hear, can't breathe through them, so he gets lost, forgetting everything else. There are worlds in his head, and he writes down what he can, draws or sketches it, even though it rarely makes sense. He has notebooks and sketchbooks and they look like the work of a madman, dark ink and light pencil jumbled together like the twists and turns of his brain. Half of his teachers think he's brilliant and the other half look at him like he's a sociopath or the antichrist.

He's used to it, gotten good at not caring, or at least acting like he doesn't. The truth is that he _does_ care, _too much_ , and every glance, every look that expects _more_ makes him ache like his lungs are too tight to breathe. His brain comes alive at night, so he skips school to sleep. It's not like they're teaching him anything he doesn't already know or can't just get out of books. He figured out high school was a joke a few days into it, and so he prefers to spend his days at the library or by the water, sleeping under bridges or in the back rooms of bars where he listens to drunk, out-of-work musicians vent their frustrations on beat up Fenders and snarled drum kits. They scream for something they can feel but can’t name, and Pete feels at home.

It comes crashing down, of course. Everything always does. He thinks of it as the laws of gravity, or maybe the law of the punk rock scene. He wants to smash things up until they splinter, break them open until he can find out what beats at the heart of them. He hasn’t figured out how not to get caught in the storm of fragments though, certainly not when it comes to the real world. He’s not in school, so he never sees the note, and he stays out as much as he can, so he never hears the phone ring. His mother knows all the code words, and the counselors know she speaks their language.

He doesn’t stand a chance, doesn’t even realize he needs one. He gets home that night after soccer practice. It’s the one thing that keeps him on the ground instead of straggling through space, and he loves the smell of wet, compacted dirt that clings to him. The new drugs haven’t taken anything away from him, but they make his heart beat slower until he’s afraid it’s going to stop altogether. Sometimes he takes them, sometimes he forgets. Sometimes he makes a deliberate choice. He didn’t take them today, so his blood is pounding and it’s real and loud and his senses are sharp, quick and silver like a razor blade.

His parents are sitting on the couch when he walks into the living room. He cocks his head because it’s too early or too late for that, and the house is eerily silent. There’s no sign of his brother or sister, and no smell of dinner or rustle of the evening paper. There’s just silence, like the calm before the storm as they unleash a torrent of words.

“…what are you thinking, Peter…”  
“…skipping school…”  
“…failing grades…”  
“…trusted you…”  
“…what’s wrong…”  
“…so disappointed…”

It’s like a hail of arrows, piercing him through. A hammer crashing down, shattering something inside him. His mouth fills with the powdered grist of his bones, crumbling to dust beneath his skin. He doesn’t even realize when they’ve stopped, because he can still hear everything repeating on an endless loop. They stare at him, waiting for answers that he doesn’t have to give. In the end, they send him to his room and tell him they’ll deal with him later. His stomach growls and he stares at the bottles – Nortriptyline, Thioridazine, Risperidone – and wonders what would happen if he just kept swallowing. Still, he promised them they’d talk later, and he knows another broken promise would just be another black mark beside his name, so he just takes one green pill and closes his eyes and keeps waiting for the world to fall away.

It never does.

**

He's not sure which offends him more - the fact that it's a short bus, which is universal for fucked up and retarded, or the fact that it's a 50's juvenile delinquent movie cliché in gun-metal gray. They’re the closest thing to convicts around, though there are designer coats and leather bags in the parking lot rather than leather jackets and motorcycle oil smeared into the asphalt. He looks around at the two other kids. They’re both taller than him, but he’s used to that. He’s small for his age. Fuck, he's small for someone _half_ his age, so he expects to look up at everyone, but he’s not used to people just not _looking_. People sometimes think he’s quiet and shy, but the truth is that he thrives on attention, needs it to remember where he is in the world. He likes the labels he can hold that way, rather than having to define himself.

These kids don’t even see him though. Look over him and through him, so wrapped up in their own disaffected youth that they don’t care that anyone else is even around. Pete starts when the bus door opens, but they don’t even flinch, and they give the bus driver a look of pure distain. It’s not the first time that Pete’s thought he doesn’t belong here, on this bus, in this life where he’s headed for 12 weeks of military style boot camp to “straighten him out”. People have always tried to straighten him out, and each time he thinks he ends up a little more bent.

The driver calls his name first and Pete raises his hand half-heartedly, unsure of what he’s supposed to do. The second time, he yells “ _Wentz_ ”, and Pete waves his hand around. “Here. Right here.”

“Bag in the back. Find a seat. Don’t talk.”

Pete hefts his duffel bag onto his shoulder and carries his backpack by the strap. He shoves the duffel in the back of the bus and hurries around to the folded door. He looks back to his parents, standing by the car, and waves. His father lifts a hand, but isn’t quite looking at him and his mom has her head buried against his father’s shoulder. He glances out the window and they’re turned away from him, backs bent as his dad helps his mom to the car. He doesn’t keep watching as the other boys load onto the bus. His brother and sister are at someone else’s house, and when they come home, he’ll be gone. They’ll spend their summer playing in the yard, running through sprinklers, seeing relatives and having fun while he’s locked away trying to be someone good, someone better. Someone he’s not sure actually exists.

**

The bus ride is noisy in the way all buses are, but everyone is silent. The other two guys from his school are spread out, no one willing to form alliances or acknowledge anyone’s existence. Pete keeps to himself, watching the sun come up like something weak and strangled through the clouds and smog. They stop at other schools, other suburbs, until the back of the bus is packed full of duffel bags and the seats are full of quiet, sullen teenagers all dressed in black and angry at the world.

Pete takes out his sketchbook and tries to draw the feeling hanging in the air, but all he manages to do is sketch something gray and amorphous, ominous portents of nothing and everything. The kid sitting next to Pete spends most of his time hissing at Pete under his breath, calling him a pussy midget faggot, leg hammering up and down so that he constantly fucks up Pete’s concentration, jars his hand and sends the pencil skittering across the page.

Pete gives up finally, jamming the sketchbook deep inside his backpack. He picks out the repeat offenders easily, the hard-bitten edges already visible beneath scarred skin and drawn on tattoos. They look straight ahead, eyes flat and cold, reptile eyes. It’s the ones like the guy beside him that Pete hates, jerks who think they own the world, like they’re the cock of the block. Soccer’s given Pete strength and stamina and being small makes him mean and resourceful, makes them underestimate him, but he doesn’t make the mistake of thinking that’s who he is. He’s just trying to make it through without drowning, without losing himself completely.

Chicago disappears, the houses disappear and give way to farmland and dirt. The world falls away, reduced to green and brown and a jittering blue sky going by in the small frame of his window, going nowhere, the middle of nowhere, nowhere to run.

He’s starving by the time they turn off the dirty asphalt and down a long, rutted drive, the bus jerking roughly from side to side. The silence in the bus gets louder and thicker, a deafening nothingness. They pass alongside the fence – chain link, electrified, guards with guns that look real enough for Pete’s stomach to curl in on itself. The silence stretches thin enough to break as they go through the gate, metal shrieking against metal as it swings shut behind them.

They’re herded out of the bus, bags tossed recklessly on the ground by the driver and two guys in uniforms. Pete wants to watch, wonders if one of the bags might rip open and spill out its insides like somebody’s secrets, but he keeps his eyes straight ahead as another guy in uniform, built like a mountain and just as rugged, stands in front of them with a sneer on his lip and a sharp glint in his eye. He looks at them like they’re dirt, less than dirt, and every cliché Pete can remember roars back through his head like feedback through speakers.

“This is where you expect a welcome speech,” his voice is gravelly and rough, like he stopped talking for a year and is just now starting again, trying to remember how. “But you’re not going to get one, because you’re not welcome here. You’re not welcome anywhere. You’ve fucked up and so nobody knows how to handle you, so they dump your sorry asses here with _us_. They want us to do what they can’t, they want us to straighten you out and make you men, but you’re not men. You’re barely even boys. Just pussy little dicks thinking you own the fucking world and it should bow down to you.” He moves closer, walking the line of them, stopping at each one and staring them in the face. Pete’s toward the end of the line, but he gets the same treatment – narrowed eyes and stern mouth, power and force pulsing under the skin – but he doesn’t look away. “The only thing this world’s going to do to you pussies is bend you over and fuck you in the ass without lube.”

Pete can sense other guys shifting in the line. Talk like this is different between themselves, bullshitters bullshitting other bullshitters, but from an adult it seems too real, too threatening. Pete feels his muscles tense, his calves tighten and his ass clench, but he keeps looking straight ahead. He’s familiar with fear, familiar enough with failure that he knows not to show it. The man moves on and Pete remembers to breathe, listening to words that berate and denigrate them. The guy who sat next to him on the bus looks like he’s going to shit his pants, and Pete wants to sigh, but the air sticks in his chest. Guys like him are worse when they’re afraid.

Their bags get thrown at them hard, hitting them solidly in the chest and Pete grabs his with both hands and hangs on. They get frog-marched to a Quonset hut that is the check in station and they get fingerprinted and photographed. Their hair gets cut and they get hosed down before they’re given faded fatigues to wear, Army boots that lace up well over their ankles. Pete rakes his fingers where his hair used to be and then rubs his scalp, feeling strangely exposed even beneath the heavy jacket. They look like miniature pit bulls, all teeth and snarl, but no real substance behind them yet. They’re all sizing each other up, judging competition and domination and Pete’s no different.

Another man in uniform comes in, a Sergeant this time, giving them hell for taking their time and telling them they can pick up their bags when they leave. All of Pete’s clothes and personal possessions that were supposed to make this somewhat tolerable are now out of reach, and instead he’s got a long hallway of bunks to welcome him to his home for the next 12 weeks, an entire semester shot to hell.

“Pick a bunk, ladies.” The sergeant gives them all a cursory glance. “If you’re lucky, you won’t get someone above you who pisses the bed.” Some of the bunks have signs on them, claimed beds for the cycle of offenders already here or those who will be here until they’re ready for Joliet. “Roll call in five minutes. Make it quick.”

Pete takes the nearest bed, close to the door, but not right next to it. He’s in the top bunk, the guy beneath him already closing on six feet, so they look like a comedy team standing next to each other. Pete follows everyone’s lead and takes off his jacket, throwing it up on his bunk. They fall out into a rough line outside the barracks and the sergeant is there with three other men. There’s some discussion as they watch them file out, watch them jockey back and forth in line, like they’re on some sort of ball, weebles wobbling. Pete’s tired, hungry and he hasn’t taken his pills in almost two days. His skin itches and burns and he wants to claw at something, make it stop, open it up to the cold, fresh air.

“Fredricks. Wentz. Martinson. Eberly. Moreno. Anders.” The main sergeant calls their names and points to an area beside him. Pete goes with the other boys whose names get called, milling amongst them in that vague petrified state of confusion, wondering whether they’ve been singled out for good or for bad, or if there _is_ a good here. Pete can feel all the other guys looking at them, feels the other guys in the same group as him wondering whose fault it is that they’re all standing clumped together. It’s like a bad joke or an after school special until the other sergeants call out their groups and, like that, they’re split off into teams. Pete’s team is Alpha and their sergeant, Sergeant Cavens, looks at them like they’re the shit on the dirt on his shoe.

“You’re fuck ups, but now you’re _my_ fuck ups, so we’re going to lay down the rules right now.” Cavens is twice as wide as Pete and clears six feet. Pete has to tilt his head back to look at him. “This isn’t some cakewalk, some fucking tea party. Your parents think you’re complete wastes of space and they’d rather ship your ass off to be fixed than deal with you. They don’t get paid to put up with your shit, and neither do I. I get paid to knock that shit out of you and make you a fucking member of society. And that’s what I’m gonna do. Reveille at five. Run at five-thirty. Breakfast at six-thirty if you’re done running. Shower by seven-fifteen. Class at seven-forty-five. Break at twelve for an hour. Lunch if you’re smart then classes from one to four. Another run and then you have an hour of free time before dinner. Lights out at eight.”

“You’re fucking kidding.”

It takes all of Pete’s willpower not to turn and look at the guy who spoke, but the rumbling around them indicates they’ve all gotten the same speech and it’s gone over just about as well in all the teams.

Cavens steps up to the guy standing two people away from Pete. Anders, he thinks. “Do I fucking look like I’m fucking kidding? Do I look like a fucking practical joker? You pissant little pussies see that flagpole?” He points into the distance, at least a good two miles across the vast expanse of the encampment. “You’ve got ten minutes.”

Pete doesn’t wait for the rest of them, he just takes off. He’s in good shape from soccer, but running in boots is harder and more cumbersome than he expects. He can run a mile in under five most of the time, so this shouldn’t be a problem, but he’s not about to risk it on the first day. Any day. He promised his parents he’d try, that this would work, and he’s not about to let them down again. Still. More.

He makes it to the flagpole two seconds before anyone else except for the sergeants, sitting there in their jeep and watching them all come straggling in. Pete holds onto the silver metal and takes deep breaths that don’t seem to fill up his lungs all the way, only moving when someone shoves him hard, pushing him past the pole and out of the way. He stays on his feet through sheer determination, but it’s tough to do and he eventually gives in and drops his hands to his knees, keeping himself balanced. He takes another hard shove to his back and hits his knees hard on the damp ground, looking up but unable to tell who pushed him down.

The last guy touches the pole and Cavens clicks the stopwatch in his hand. “Seventeen point five.” He shakes his head slowly, giving the other sergeants a look that can only be interpreted as ‘why us’? “Think we’re going to have to rethink our schedule. You’ve now got five minutes to wake up and hit the track and breakfast only after ten miles. Good luck with that, boys.” This time there’s no contradictions or arguments, no noise at all. Cavens gets out of the jeep and stands, his feet directly in front of Pete. Pete manages to get to his feet and finds himself face to face with Cavens. “You think you’re hot shit?”

“No.”

“NO?” It’s a dangerous tone and Pete realizes a second too late what he’s said.

“No, sir.”

“Wentz, right?”

“Yes, sir.” Pete’s lungs burn, his face burns with humiliation. He loves attention, loves people _seeing_ him, but this he hates – being singled out for failing, for fucking up. He just wishes the two weren’t so closely related, intermingled.

“You just bought your team a run back to the barracks.” The other five bite back words and glare at Pete, their eyes saying everything their voices can’t. He nods at Cavens and drops his eyes as Cavens looks around at them all. “As for the rest of you pussies, you walk back. You’ll find name badges on your bunks. I hope you can sew, because Mama ain’t here to do it for you, and from here on out, it’s you and your team. Gonna have to watch who you screw over now.” He turns back to Pete and leans in, his breath foul as he screams. “RUN!”

Pete takes off and doesn’t look back.

**

He doesn’t sleep that night, too keyed up and over the edge of exhausted. He can hear his bunkmates after lights-out, whispering quietly until no one seems to care, and then talking louder. He hears his name once in a while, and he knows that, whatever he does from now on, he’s branded for life by these guys. He dozes off around three, counting off the minutes and hours in his head to block out the rest of the sounds.

The reveille blast wakes him and he’s jumping out of his bunk before he even knows what he’s doing. He lands hard, but it only stings for a minute, long enough to tug on the pants he’s got shoved into his boots and jerk them up his hips. His bunkmate is still trying to sit up and Pete’s tugging his jacket on, WENTZ in bold letters across the left chest, and heading out the door. The cold hits him like a slap in the face and it shuts his head up for a minute, and he remembers the rush of air he’d get at the docks or under the bridges, places where everything else got washed away by the shocking sting of something bigger than him.

He’s alone for most of the run, finishing in decent time, though his stride is fucked the last half mile, blisters rubbing raw beneath the boots. There’s a line out the door of the mess hall when he gets there and he doesn’t recognize anyone. The guys don’t even notice him and it’s not ignoring, it’s just that they’ve been trained not to look, not to see. It creeps Pete out and fear heats up his stomach, the thought of being invisible clawing inside him, his own personal demons trying to get out.

He gets inside and heads up to the stacks of ocher and periwinkle trays, shuffling along behind the rest of the line. The mess hall is silent except for the clink and clatter of metal and plastic. The cups are tin, filled with water or watered down milk from small spigots and huge vats like something out of a science fiction movie. He finally gets to the trays, fingers curling around the edges to pick it up when a fist slams down in the center of it, smashing his fingers between the layers of preformed plastic.

He bites back a yowl of pain, swallowing it down before it slips out. Cavens stands on the other side of the stacks of trays, his eyes like two dirty cigar stubs. “Where’s your team, Wentz?”

“Running, sir.”

“Running.” Cavens moves closer and his breath is rancid. “They’re fucking _running_.”

“Yes, sir.” Pete feels breathless and out of his head, his feet not touching the ground.

“You’re a goddamned _team_ , Wentz. You’re not some self-sufficient little fuckwad jerking your own tiny dick. Against the wall.” He jerks his head and Pete pulls his hands away from the trays, moving quickly. He gets his back to the wall, his heels hard against it. Cavens follows him and gets too close, his chest in Pete’s face. “You’ll eat after all of them.”

“Yes, sir.” Pete exhales shakily. His stomach growls, his blood pounding in his ears. He doesn’t remember the last time he ate, and he can feel the hot jittery burn under his skin, his medications gone from his system and he’s alone in his body, alone in his head.

He counts to himself – how many kids, how many adults, how many blue trays, how many yellow, how many waters, how many milks, how many tiles, how many minutes – until his teammates come in late, dragging with the rest of the barrack. Pete watches them, his whole body tensing as they walk through the door and ignore him, moving into line. The few of them that do pay him any attention sneer, contempt written across their faces. He waits until they’re all lined up before he dares push off the wall. Straggling along at the end, he watches the rest of the guys. He knows he hasn’t made any friends, but he looks for anything resembling sympathy or understanding. Everyone steadfastly pretends he doesn’t exist and he turns his gaze to his feet.

He lets himself smell the food now, grease and salt and flour heavy in the air, reconstituted eggs swimming pale yellow on the edges of his vision. He can almost taste it, and his stomach is even louder when it growls, loud enough to garner attention. He stands stiffly, careful not to cross his arms over his chest or stomach, to draw eyes to him. He just moves with the line, ever closer, smells getting stronger. Pete bites his lip, swallowing saliva.

The guy in front of him, one of those on Delta team, grabs his tray and Pete nearly groans in relief as he grabs his own tray, fingers curling tightly, no intention of letting go again.

“Sorry, junior.” The kid behind the counter slams a large metal lid over the half-full dish of eggs. “All out.”

“Out.” It’s not a question. He just nods and moves on, carrying his empty tray down the line, listening and watching as cover after cover goes on, the sound almost musical. It’s a drum beat in his head, the shuffle of feet a rhythm guitar, the thump of trays and the hiss of the sprayer he can glimpse through the open window, cleaning off dirty trays in a shower of mist, are an exotic bass line, hints of percussion. He focuses on the sounds, losing himself in the space inside his head.

He gets a cup of lukewarm milk, dry and chalky like it was mixed from powder. He drinks it slowly, savoring, and sits at the end of the table, effectively shunned by silence. It will be harder now that he’s wearing a target along with his fatigues, but he knows what to do. Head down. Middle of the pack. Hide in plain sight.

He’s careful to stay with his team, not to get too far ahead or too far behind. He finally eats at lunch and it’s nearly impossible not to shovel the food in, to gorge himself on vaguely blue potatoes and grayish meat, the virulent orange and green of the peas and carrots like flashing neon. He hates sauces like the gravy that congeals on his meat and potatoes and he hates his vegetables mixed, touching, but he eats every bite, chasing the remaining gravy with a dried slab of bread. His stomach aches when he’s done – too full too fast – and the urge to throw it all up lingers at the back of his throat.

**

The first time it happens he’s in the bathroom. It’s the half hour before lights out and everyone else is in the barracks. He can hear them through the door, loud and obnoxious and _brothers_ and Pete has to close himself off from it. He leans against the door of the stall and imagines anywhere but here, anywhere but this time, this place. He thinks about Janine back home, her dirty blonde hair and the blue streak that goes from her temple to just past her shoulder, curling against her collar. He thinks of the way she let him touch her in the locker room, rushed and panicked and everything on her soft as her skin and hard as the muscles beneath it. He thinks of the way she smelled and the way she didn’t ask questions, just let him breathe her in, taste her skin.

His cock is hard and he wants relief. He’s fourteen and he can’t help thinking about sex. It’s all promise and allure and whispered words and pictures in magazines he’s not supposed to see. But it’s also someone like Janine, and the thoughts get away from him and he wraps his hand around himself. He bites back the groan that threatens to escape because he’s only got a few minutes and he doesn’t want them interrupted by anyone, anything. Just relief. He can’t find it in his run anymore, too busy making sure he’s staying in his box of space, somewhere in between everyone else, so he tries to find it in this. His fingers are too tight then too loose then just right and he makes a noise at the back of his throat. Janine’s skin is perfect, small freckles on her shoulder, on her nose.

The door slams hard into him and he stumbles forward, releasing his cock to catch himself from falling into the wall or the toilet. He can hear the noises then, the laughter and viciousness that lurks in bedtime horror stories and teenage boys.

“Look at the faggot.” He doesn’t know who says it, and he figures it doesn’t matter really. He’s hard and they’re looking for revenge and it’s easy enough to slap a label on him. He’s fourteen and discovering sex and sexuality and the images of Janine get muted, hot breath and laughter of half naked boys dancing on his skin, superimposed over her gold and blue hair until it’s a whirl of buzz cuts and breasts, blue streaks and boxer shorts.

Afterwards he just lies there on the cooling tile floor of the showers, steam still hanging in the air. He can taste blood in his mouth, metallic and strangely sweet, and his whole body aches. He forces himself into a sitting position and spits blood on the floor. It takes a few minutes to get to his feet, and even then he has to stabilize himself against the wall. He doesn’t look down, doesn’t want to see. He just makes his way over to the nearest shower head and turns the water on high, letting the hard pulse of heat wash away blood and spit and worse, wondering how hard and how hot he needs it to be to wash away shame.

He knows he shouldn’t close his eyes, but he thinks they’re done for tonight, so he does anyway. He tilts his face to the spray, swallowing mouthfuls of hot water along with choked, silent sobs. His body shakes and he braces himself on the wall again, head hanging forward. He risks opening his eyes and looking, and he groans under his breath. Bruises are darkening on his skin, blue and purple mottling his flesh. He reaches down and wraps careful fingers around his dick. He hisses at the touch, pain shooting along his nerve endings and he releases it carefully, even the swing and weight of it causing him to catch his breath.

His cock is flaccid now, aching and bruised just like the rest of him. He can’t think about running in the morning, just the thought of it makes him sway in anticipation of the pain. He shuts off the water, suddenly overwhelmed by the feel of it, and shivers in the sudden cold. The bathroom is mercifully deserted, inhabited only by the contents of his locker, scattered all over the floor. His clothes are ground in with dirt and worse, boot marks and things he doesn’t want to imagine darkening the white of his briefs, the muddied greens of his fatigues. He picks his things up carefully and dumps them into one of the utility sinks, pumping in water to wash everything away. He’s naked and shivering, and by the time he gets his clothes anywhere close to clean, the water runs cold and his clothes are soaking wet and somewhere in the distance, reveille is playing.

Pete barely catches Alpha, lagging behind as his skin rubs raw inside his boots and wet socks. He weighs more, heavier with water, and every jolt of his feet hitting the ground is like torture. He doesn’t make it to breakfast, and by the time he sinks into his chair in the classroom, every part of him is on fire with pain. He’s grateful for being ignored, using the class time to focus on anything but the pain, even geometry.

He hears the whispers and snickers. It’s hard not to and, by the time they’re all gathered in the mess hall for lunch, it’s clear that the news has spread. A couple of older boys look at him with what he realizes in shock is interest, but whatever heat he might have felt is burnt down to nothing, extinguished under a torrent of insults and worse. Too much worse for Pete to think about, to remember.

“Wentz.”

He snaps his attention to his left, blinking to focus on Marcus, the person sleeping in the bunk beneath him, repeat offender, Charlie team. “Yes?”

Marcus smiles, eyes bright as the sky and completely empty. “Jordan says he thinks you jizzed on him when he tried to bust your balls. He and Eric want to know if you’re into that pain shit.”

Pete feels the flush and hates it, hates _this_. He wants to take it all back, go back in time and take the pills, swallow them down one after the other until he’s normal, until he’s not someone to ship away, an unwanted gift sent back in the hopes of exchanging him for something _right_.

“You’d better keep that pencil dick away from me, Wentz. I so much as hear you whipping it out to jack off, I’m gonna make last night look like your favorite party ever. Got it?”

Pete nods once, his head jerking at the end of his neck like one of the big-headed dogs or hula girls his cousin, Marc, has on the dashboard of his car.

“In fact,” Jordan – Bravo company, new like Pete, nothing like Pete – leans in and he has the musty, musky smell that lingers in high school locker rooms, adolescent boy ripe with fear and want and their own false sense of power. “I’d be really fucking careful about taking it out for _any_ reason. Never know when one of the boys might take it wrong.”

Pete nods again. It’s a warning too late, but more than he expected, or maybe it’s a mind game, since he’s suddenly overwhelmed by the urge to go to the bathroom, his dick feeling heavy and full. He presses his hand against his groin, damp fabric leaving him feeling chafed. No one else is paying attention to him now, and he stares down at his empty tray, making promises to a God he’s not sure he believes in that this is a new start.

**

Not even a week goes by before it happens again. He knows because he keeps track of time on a calendar from 1978 that someone posted up beside his bunk and no one’s thought to take down. According to the calendar it’s August eighth, and Pete been in here for three weeks, two days. The bruises have almost faded, and yesterday he managed to take a leak without pain or blood. He only uses campus bathrooms, never going into the barracks one. His head hasn’t shut up and it’s all memorization and regurgitation of rote, the instructors voices joining all the others up there.

He’s in the bathroom taking a piss when he hears the stall doors open. He’s learned that the empty bathroom on the second floor of the main campus is the best place for him to go, no one has classes here during the summer session, and so he’s safer. He realizes the error of that logic when five guys come out of the stalls, visible in his peripheral vision. He doesn’t know any of them, which scares him more than the thought of what they might do. He realizes his body has frozen, and so he’s holding his dick uselessly.

“You’re Wentz.” One of the kids speaks and Pete wants to look, to see who it is that’s going to beat the crap out of him, but he can’t manage to turn to face him. He wants to close his eyes and not see any of it, just float somewhere outside himself while it all happens, not feeling it until he’s alone and curled on the floor in a fetal position. He doesn’t think to nod, it seems ridiculous. They wouldn’t be here if he _wasn’t_ who they thought he was.

This time is different.

There’s still pain. There’s a boot at his throat, grinding against his windpipe just hard enough to make him want it harder, to just end it all. There are boots kicking at his sides and legs, but they leave his dick alone for the most part, but then, as his air gets low, his dick gets harder and they start laughing, one of the guys wetting a towel and slapping his dick with it, sharp stings until Pete looses control completely. The laughter is nothing as the boot moves from his throat and sweet, cold air rushes into his lungs, his head. He gulps it down, letting it pound through him, focusing on the rise and fall of his chest, the hum of oxygen in his brain. His throat hurts, but he doesn’t feel anything below that, doesn’t even really see as he’s showered in piss and come, eyes unseeing as he stares at them. He lies there unmoving as they finish and leave, laughing and joking like they’ve won some sort of victory. He thinks about never moving again and wonders if anyone would notice.

He remembers reading something about getting rid of offending body parts. He’s not sure if it was history or a story, the Bible or something else, but he wonders if this would be happening if his body would stop betraying him. He thinks about girls and his body surges, feels full and hungry, but then he thinks about his soccer teammate, Michael, and the same thing happens. He reaches down, wondering if he can do enough damage that his dick will be normal or be _gone_ , that all the shit that’s wrong in his head will stop showing on the outside.

All he’s succeeded in doing is leaving deep scratches at the base of his dick when the janitor finds him a few hours later and helps him to his feet. Neither of them speak as he leads Pete down to the supply room, flipping through the ring heavy with keys until he finds the right one. The room is lit green with the exit light and Pete strips out of his clothes and into a new set of fatigues as soon as the janitor tosses the right size at him. He shivers – he still smells awful and he doesn’t think he’s ever going to be warm again – but at least he’s dry. He wants to burn the other uniform, but the janitor just picks it up with gloved hands and tosses it into his cart to take to the laundry.

“I…” His voice is rough, raspy. “Thank you.” It sounds like he’s talking around a mouthful of rocks, feels like he’s trying to swallow gravel. The janitor looks at him and Pete realizes he’s the first person he’s seen since he came here that isn’t in uniform. It’s almost a relief, almost normal, until he places his hand on Pete’s shoulder and shoves him down to his knees. Pete’s not stupid, he _gets_ it, but he wants to laugh. He’s made it this far, only to be saved by the person who wants even more than the vultures already picking at his bones.

He closes his eyes tight, wondering where the voices are now that he wants them. He gags on the smell, on the taste, and his knees and legs shake as he makes his way back to the barracks. The lights are already off and he can hear the steady breathing, the rise and fall that only comes from lack of fear. Pete gets in his bed and stares at the ceiling, wondering if he’ll ever sleep again.

**

He stops keeping track of the days by the calendar, tossing it in the trashcan one morning in the pre-dawn dark. He hasn’t slept more than three hours at a time, constantly waking up with his muscles coiled, tense and ready to defend himself. It’s never the slow stretch of morning either. It’s always the sudden threat of danger.

He eats too much to give his body calories to burn, learning to ignore pain as the sergeants push them past points of endurance. He spends time on his back, humiliated and desecrated, and on his knees, vomiting and thanking his unlikely savior. He cringes in the shower, refusing to look and possibly see someone, something familiar. He keeps his gaze on the wall if his eyes aren’t closed, never even looking at himself. Just the thought of touching himself makes him shudder and the taste of bile rises thick in his throat. He hears the other boys, soft muted cries that they try to muffle with fists or pillows and sometimes a different kind of jolt goes through him, and he digs his nails into his palms until the feeling subsides.

Pete’s been up for a day and a half when the first mail gets distributed. He gets a face full of envelopes when he doesn’t answer to his name quickly enough, and he scrambles to catch them before they fall to the ground.

There are letters from his parents, all variations on a theme - _They’re sorry. Please understand. Get better. They didn’t know what else to do._ \- and he doesn’t finish the second one, doesn’t bother to try the third or fourth. The last envelope contains two other letters, one from each of his siblings. His sister’s loopy, flowery scrawl takes up three pages in huge, crooked lines, talking about her stuffed animals missing him, about cartoons and asking when he’s coming home. His brother’s letter is barely half a page, obviously required as a writing exercise, half of his letters backwards and most of it scribbled drawings that look like the guy from the painting “The Scream”. Those make Pete feel strangely better, almost normal, or at least as close to it as he’s ever gotten.

“What’s up, Wentz? You get a love letter from your boyfriend?” Jordan’s voice is pitched too high, mocking, and Pete knows he should ignore it. The problem is that knowing what he should do and doing it don’t always go together.

“Nah. I haven’t heard from your brother since he started fucking your mom.”

He hits the concrete hard and that’s the last thing he remembers. He wakes up in the infirmary and he can’t see clearly. Shaking his head to fix his vision makes him black out again and he’s not sure how much time has passed when he manages to sit up again, everything slightly fuzzy, but not moving of its own volition.

“You don’t have a concussion.”

Pete nearly jumps at the voice, but he manages to stay still. It hasn’t helped him yet, though he’s not sure why he’s taking advice from _Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom_ , but it’s better than running. Never show fear. He blinks and turns his head. Cavens is sitting there, legs stretched out in front of him and his arms crossed over his chest. Pete manages a nod even though it makes his head scream. “That’s good, right?”

“Yes.” Cavens takes a deep breath and sits up straight, leaning in so his elbows are on his knees, his gaze trained sharply on Pete. “I heard what you said to Michaelson. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“You’d be surprised what I have in me.” He realizes what he says after it slips past his mouth and he blushes, the red burning his face. He can’t help but think about rooms glowing in red and green emergency exit signs, bleach scented closets and the wet slop from the mop bucket cold against his knees.

“That’s what this place is about.” He laces his fingers together and keeps staring at Pete, not looking away. “You think I’m an asshole, and you’re right, but this is boot camp, not pussy camp. I don’t care what you did that got you sent here…”

“I skipped class.”

He takes a minute to start again, Pete’s interruption obviously throwing him off his stride. “And I don’t care. You’re another face. Another smart-mouthed, know-it-all, teenaged punk who doesn’t give a shit about the world around him. That’s why you’re here. Because you think you’re the center of the universe and somebody told you were wrong and you got pissed off. My job is to show you just how fucking small you are.”

“Trust me, I know how small I am.” Pete tries to laugh but only manages a smirk.

“What made you stand up to him finally?”

Pete’s quiet for a long minute and he wonders how much Cavens knows. He wonders if it would make a difference one way or the other if he knew everything. “I don’t know. Maybe it was just too much.”

Cavens sighs and Pete’s fairly certain he gave the wrong answer, even if he’s not sure that there is a _right_ answer. “Sleep here tonight. Parents’ weekend is coming up. You look like you could use the rest.”

“Parents’ weekend?” He closes his eyes and tries to remember the information his mother gave him. Education. Discipline. Self-esteem. Teamwork. Self-reliance. Courses. Exercise. “That’s at eight weeks.”

“It’s been eight weeks.”

Pete swallows hard. Eight weeks down means only four more to go. He laughs roughly, emotion thick in his throat. Cavens looks at him oddly, and it’s all Pete can do not to let the hot tears burning his eyes slip down his cheeks. “Time flies when you’re having fun, I guess.”

“We’ll expect you with your team at reveille.”

“I’ll be there, sir.” Pete shifts back onto the thin pillow and stares up at the ceiling. He feels every pulse of blood through his head, making pain spark along his nerve endings. Still, it’s the first time he’s felt safe since he got on the bus back at New Trier High School. He hears Cavens get up to leave and he doesn’t close his eyes until he hears the door shut behind him. He knows he won’t sleep, can’t sleep, doesn’t sleep, but he reaches up and presses on the center of the stinging pain in his head, wondering if he can exert enough pressure to make himself black out again.

**

He stands at attention with the rest of the camp, like something out of a movie or a marching band. All of the parents are required to go through a lecture reminding them that their children are here for a reason, that aren’t the same any more. It’s not quite the truth, but not a lie either. He’s the same person he always has been, only now he knows how not to let it show, how to hold it all inside until nothing else can penetrate, until the surface tension breaks and he shatters like overheated glass.

There are some differences. He writes down some of the thoughts now, hidden in the half-folded back pages of his class notebooks. Poetry or stories or lyrics or maybe just words, too sharp to keep inside, so they slice him open and bleed out onto the page.

A trumpet sounds and there is a solid shift, all of them suddenly more rigid in their stance. Pete feels the lingering pain, but he puts it aside. If he can make it through this, the countdown starts in earnest and freedom is close enough to taste. The campus is suddenly littered with bright colors – dresses and shirts and skirts and pants and long hair whipping in the breeze. The air is heavy with unspoken prayers - _let him be better, let them take me home_ \- until their overridden by the overblown words that mean nothing.

“…you look good…”  
“…how’s the food…”  
“…we’ve missed you…”  
“…do you like it here…”

He wonders what it would take for someone to answer truthfully, to spill out all the secrets. The problem with secrets like his is that they’re the ones too shocking to believe, to unbelievable to be true, too painful to be lies.

He sees his parents as they crest the slope of the hill. His mom is dressed in blue and his dad in tan and white. They look unreal, even as they get closer. He stays locked at attention until they’re right in front of him. He’s not sure why really, unless he’s trying to prove he’s healed, fixed, better and somehow that’s all there in the way he can hold his body still and rigid.

“Pete.” His mother breathes his name and pulls him against her. He wants to resist and let her see how it feels to be unwanted, but the scent of her perfume, the familiar hint of tea and powder overload his senses and he clings to her so tightly it hurts. “Pete.”

“Show us around,” his dad says, his voice too bright as he slaps Pete on the back. The bruises there heat up - _shoved against the mats in the gymnasium by boys he doesn’t know, interrupted before it could go too far_ \- but he’s learned not to flinch. He gives them the same tour all the parents get, adding in silent details. “This is the obstacle course.” He demonstrates a run-through without stopping, without adding, “and this is the pit of mud where I was nearly suffocated while my pissed of team members kicked and punched me.” He answers all their questions, though he knows they must wonder about his vagueness.

Does he have friends? A few. One good one. _Surely if he’s sucking the janitor’s cock, he should count as a friend. Pete doesn’t know his name though, so maybe he’s wrong._ Does he like it here? The classes are interesting and practical. His stamina’s never been better from all the running he’s done. It’s not a yes or no, but it suffices.

The questions stop when he slips and calls his dad ‘sir’. The awkward silence carries them into the mess hall, through the classrooms and the barracks and along the path that leads back toward the main office and parking lot. He manages to ask how they are, how his brother and sister are doing. He’s not sure what his parents think. His mother looks worried and he knows he has circles under his eyes, knows his smile is more feral than open.

“Pete,” she whispers and squeezes his hand. He wants to crawl inside her arms, find someplace safe again.

“I’m sorry,” he chokes. “I’m sorry. I’ll be good. I’ll be better.”

“Pete.” Her fingers are warm pressure on the back of his head. It takes time for him to relax, to realize they’re her fingers, that he’s safe. “We just want you to be okay.”

“I am. I will. I’ll take the pills. Whatever pills. Please.”

“Just a little longer. See this through.”

“Please,” his voice clogs with emotion and he can feel the unwelcome burn of tears in his eyes. “Please, Mom…”

Her own voice is thick and shaking as she pulls away. “You’re going to be okay, Pete. You’ll be home soon.”

“Please, Mom.” He can’t swallow and the voices in his head wake up and start screaming as she pulls away. His hand clenches, wanting to curl around a pencil, something sharp to scratch out the words, to get them out somehow since he can’t get them out of his throat. “Please.”

Her touch lingers, her fingers grazing his cheek. “Just a few more weeks, Pete. You’re doing so well. They’ve told us how well you’re doing.”

Pete blinks rapidly, staring straight ahead, not seeing her anymore. He manages a nod, taking a step back. He can’t meet her eyes, can’t look at his father. “Yes.” He swallows hard and then exhales. His voice sounds strange to his ears, but his parents’ expressions don’t change. “I’m doing well. It’ll be fine.”

“It will.” His mother touches his jaw and Pete fights the instinct to jerk away. “You’ll be home before you know it.”

“Yeah.” He steps back with a nod and swallows hard once more. “Have a safe drive.” He watches them turn, helplessness swallowing him, his mother’s backwards glance almost enough to undo him. They walk past the main building and out toward the gate. Pete doesn’t breathe until they’re out of sight, and it’s only then that he realizes he can’t.

**

Things change after that, though it takes a few days for Pete to realize it. The same sharp sense of fear clings to him, but for the most part, he gets left alone. Maybe it’s the intrusion of the real world, a reminder of the way things work when they’re not acting out some militant version of Lord of the Flies. Still, it’s not until almost a week later that he realizes no one has cornered him, no one has turned a chance meeting into a lesson in humiliation, subjugation. Ironically it makes thinks worse, and he jumps at ever sound, every time someone gets too close.

He spends all of his free time in his bunk, glancing up every few minutes to make sure the walls or the other boys aren’t closing in on him. The rest of his focus is on the words in his head, pouring out almost too fast for him to write them down. He hums off beat music that doesn’t quite fit any of it, until he realizes it’s a bass line and everything builds around that. Some of the words are too personal, thick and black like what’s inside him, and others just sound right, screaming long after he puts them on the page. He borders them with sketches, made up visions that hold everything together. He writes in the dark, unable to do more than catnap, living on adrenaline and creation, running on fumes, on afterburners.

He starts counting the days again, but this time he’s not the only one. The world keeps getting closer, the real smells and colors lingering just on the edges of their senses, just outside the gates.

He lets his guard down, too focused on what’s coming to pay attention to what’s happening around him. It goes back to where it started, the showers, where sounds echo strangely, only the hollow rhythm of the spray hitting him and the tiled floor filling the space. Pete feels the tension leech out of him with the hot water, the coil of fear and frustration loosening slightly in the promise of freedom.

He rests one hand on the wall and lets the water beat down on his head, breathes through the steam. He makes a low nose as he shivers, strange sensations sparking along his spine. He opens his eyes and bites his lower lip to keep any sound from escaping, the foreign sight of his cock – erect, hard, not _numb_ \- is vaguely familiar, something from a lifetime of weeks ago and it’s with a kind of horrified fascination that he reaches down, hand curving naturally around the flesh, moving on instinct.

The ‘oh’ slips out before he can stop it, and his fingers tighten in reflex. He chokes back the next sound, his free hand curling into a fist against the slick tile wall as he strokes himself in earnest. It’s like the pins and needles after his foot falls asleep, sharp shocks of feeling, almost painful in their intensity. He tightens his hand more, shifting his grip, and opens his eyes, watching as he strokes.

“Are you fucking retarded?” The voice breaks in, distant and familiar, but Pete doesn’t know it, doesn’t recognize it. It sounds like all the voices since he came here and even before, full of disgust and disappointment. He doesn’t stop his hand, doesn’t even slow, though his erection wanes slightly. He wants this. He needs this. He’s _earned_ this.

“Goddamned fucking freak.” The voice gets closer and Pete’s instincts go to war with his frozen limbs. Neither fight or flight is an option, only freeze. Except he can’t quite, can’t stop moving. Can’t stop _now_. “You’re one of those fucking perverts, aren’t you, Wentz? You been getting off on all this shit?” His horse-like laugh lets Pete place him. Echo team. The boys who aren’t going anywhere at the end of the term.

“You cock-sucking little _perv_.” He steps closer and Pete realizes there’s more than one of them in the room, there are bodies on either side of him, and his breath catches and his cock jerks painfully, danger coursing with the blood to flood heat into his stomach. “You creepy fucking faggot.” Pete’s cock jerks harder, fully hard, slick and wet in his hand. The words wash over him, his body shaking at the implied threat. His heart is pounding, his dick is _throbbing_ and Pete’s hips roll forward.

“You sick fuck.” Another voice this time, and then the words go away, overwhelmed by the onslaught of Pete’s orgasm. When he stops seeing blinding flashes behind his eyelids, he looks around and realizes he’s alone. His dick feels raw, and disgust and bile rise up his throat as realization hits him.

What he just did. What was just said. That, like his fucked up sleep and his screaming head, his body betrays him too, turned on – or unable to turn _off_ \- not even in self-preservation.

He drives off quickly and gets dressed, locking the door of the showers and hiding in a corner with the voices in his head. When the security detail jiggles the doorknob hours later, he counts off heartbeats and then hurries to his room, crawling into his bunk. Another day, but he’s lost track again, and he’s convinced that it’s never going to end.

Reveille sounds and they’re all dressed before the last echo fades in the distance. Delta team is at the door when Cavens opens it, blocking their path. Everyone scurries back to their bunks, all of them standing at attention at the foot of the beds.

“Excellent timing, gentlemen.” Cavens closes the barracks door and looks at each of them. None of them move. “Each of you came here because you’d fucked up along the way. Some of you fucked up while you were here. Some of you will fuck up again and I’ll see your asses next term or the next. Some of you are just as likely to end up in Joliet or end up dead.” He stops at the end of the row of bunks and turns to face them all again. “Our job here is to teach you about discipline, about the men you are, about what it takes to survive. Some of you aren’t going to survive.”

Pete feels a chill and he’s careful not to react, to show anything. Cavens’ eye goes to each one of them in turn, and Pete makes sure to hold his gaze, not to blink or look away.

“Your personal belongings are outside the door. We’ll forward reports of your progress to your schools, your counselors. Make sure you take everything you want to keep with you.” Pete waits as everyone falls out, moving to gather their belongings. Notebooks and secret stashes appear like Cavens isn’t even there. Pete takes his time, tugging his notebook from beneath his pillow and looking around. There’s nothing else here he wants, nothing he wants to take with him, not even the lessons he’s supposedly learned. He walks outside the barracks and his bags are against the wall. No one was willing to take the extra time to destroy something else of his when freedom was within reach.

“You’re never going to make it in the real world,” Cavens informs him as Pete shoves his notebook in his backpack and slings it over his shoulder, gripping the duffel bag tightly by the handle. “You could come back here a million times and you’re never going to make it any different.”

“So what do I do?” Pete’s not ashamed of the question. It’s the only one he has left to ask.

“I don’t know,” Cavens tells him brusquely, though he follows the comment with a strange smile. “Survive the real world until you can make your own.”

**

The bus ride home isn’t much different than the one that had left his high school three months before. Same kids, same bus, same lack of hope. Pete keeps looking for something to have changed as the bus stops at school after school after school, disgorging them one at a time with their too short hair, wearing street clothes that don’t quite fit anymore – too loose on their hips, too broad in their shoulders, calves wrapped too tight in what used to be comfortable jeans, their arms with new muscle that will likely turn to fat for most of them.

Pete hums under his breath, a tune that’s not quite there, disjointed words tangled in the rhythm. He concentrates on the periphery, not trying to force it, but afraid to let go. He frees his sketchpad from where it’s been shoved in his backpack for months, bypassing the nearly filled class notebook for the solid weight of the artist paper. He sketches quickly, his eyes closed as he focuses on the music. His hand doesn’t need him to guide it.

New as it is to him when he looks down at the thick black heart in the hollowed air of the bat, he knows it like a memory jarred loose, the collective unconscious filling in all he needs to know. He tucks his knees up to his chest, sneakered feet on the edge of the seat, and presses his forehead against the pad until the picture fills and blurs his vision. He breathes in the dryness of the paper, the sweet chemical smell of the ink. It all makes sense somewhere in his head, and his fingers curl tightly around the edges of the paper, trying to hold on to the feeling.

He’s not sure how long he sits there like that, not sure when the buildings got closer together and when the sky traded in for a different suit of gray. He barely has time to notice that before the familiar marquee sign of his high school flashes by. Classes start in two days. The leaves are changing colors for fall and Pete hasn’t even had a summer. He has a farmer’s tan from his green camp-issued t-shirt, but three months have fallen away. He realizes, as the bus’s compression brakes blow a groan of hot air and the door unseals, that he wants it all back now that it’s far too late.

The other two boys say goodbye to each other and Pete watches as they walk away. The silence and introspection of the bus ride roll off of them, skin they shed easily, and he can see their familiar faces, their masks of wealth and popularity covering up whatever scars they may have acquired.

His parents are standing by the car, waiting for him to gather his stuff. He feels a chill, the night air cooling off, and it’s too cold for his summer clothes and short hair. He bypasses his mom and dad, not noticing any overtures they make as he passes. Instead he just crawls into the backseat of the car, his head on his duffel bag. He’s half-asleep when the engine turns over, and he doesn’t remember any of the drive home.  



End file.
